


lost things

by ten_and_a_rose



Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Angst, Bad Wolf, Episode: s02e13 Doomsday, F/M, Missing Scene, So much angst, White Wall, right in the feels
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-31
Updated: 2016-07-31
Packaged: 2018-07-28 12:39:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 882
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7640494
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ten_and_a_rose/pseuds/ten_and_a_rose
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She throws her head back until it collides hard against the wall and she sees stars, a universe of stars that coalesce deep in her bones, visceral, preternatural. And what rises from her lungs is nothing quite human.</p>
<p>
  <i>She <b>howls.</b></i>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	lost things

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Caedmon](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Caedmon/gifts).



> This begins at the end of the Doomsday “white wall” scene and is my contribution to tumblr's Doomsday Month as well as the [timepetalsprompts](timepetalsprompts.tumblr.com) “doomsday” prompt. This is also a random angsty gift to [Caedmon](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Caedmon/pseuds/Caedmon) for being wonderful (and because her prompt request from me isn’t yet filled - I’m still working on it, love, I promise!)!!

_Rose._

She swears she hears him,  _feels_  him there on the other side of the wall, just out of reach.  She flattens her ear against the expanse of white and strains with all she has to pull him in, to hold him, to answer him.  For the space of one breath he’s there, a living ghost in her head, then he slips away – the last she’ll ever have of him, a single gauzy tendril whispering undying love and crushing grief.  It’s the most desolate thing she’s ever felt and she vows to keep it close like a perfect secret.   _Forever._

Forever was so short.

Her hands fall away from the wall as she swerves around and sags back against it.  That’s when the silence sets in, a heavy dank fog that leaves a hush so thick she can hear her single heart hammering like a stubborn unending drum against her ribs.  She can’t fathom how that can be, that it’s still going blithely on as if nothing’s happened.  On and on and on and  _how can that be_  when she feels torn in half?

Slowly she raises her eyes and looks out beyond her feet.  And there they are, the rest of the players in this pointless tragedy.  All of them are gaping at her, standing there in an idiot horizontal line like gawkers at a train crash.

Maybe that’s exactly what they are.  It’s all gone off the rails and they’re standing there staring because they haven’t a clue what to do or to say.  Pete’s staring at his feet.  Mickey’s staring straight at her like a rabbit facing a hungry wolf, and Mum… Mum’s biting her lower lip, her face all belated realisation and helplessness and guilt.

Rose feels shattered and selfish and the rhythm inside speeds up, bangs louder and _louder and **louder**_ until what boils over is unexpected  _ **rage**_.

She throws her head back until it collides hard against the wall and she sees stars, a universe of stars that coalesce deep in her bones, visceral, preternatural. And what rises from her lungs is nothing quite human.

_She **howls.**_

_Burning_ , she thinks, she’s  _burning_ with inexplicable _fury_ and thinks she _hates_ , she _hates them all_.  Hates Jackie for not letting go, for figuring it all out too late.  Hates Mickey just because he’s there.  Hates Pete, hates Pete most of all.  Hates Pete,  _hates_  him – because at exactly the wrong time, he was a  _father._ Because _he caught her._

As her breath is spent and the howl dies away so does the heat, and she knows she does not hate anyone – least of all them.

Still, falling… she thinks falling would’ve been better.

Then – no.  She’s stronger than such things.  She’s _more_.  He’d told her, filled in the bullet-hole gaps in her memory, but –

_I am the Bad Wolf._

Suddenly, her vision blurs a brilliant gold and white. His narrative takes on _shape_ and _form_ and _life_ and she **_remembers_** _._

Her legs give out.

She slides down the wall and onto the floor and clamps her eyes shut tight, so tight it hurts.  She is the Bad Wolf… but she is _alone_.

Noise erupts around her and she knows it’s them and perhaps she should care – but that’s asking too much.

The silence was heavy but the noise now is worse, suffocating and relentless as voices call her name, talk  _to_  her, talk  _around_  her, talk  _about_  her.  A hand is on her shoulder as Mickey’s gentle murmur asks her to look at him, to get up, can she get up?  Pete is impatiently barking orders and Mum is shrill and pleading and there is just  _so much_  she claps her hands around her ears –

_Stop, just stop, just **stop!**_

She doesn’t know if she was thinking or chanting or bloody screaming but it doesn’t matter because finally, mercifully, everything goes quiet.  She clamps her arms around her shins and curls in on herself until she’s balled up so tightly her muscles burn, face buried in her knees, arms wrapped around her legs and fingers digging bruises into skin.

Seconds pass before a ginger, tentative touch brushes her shoulder, but it’s quickly snatched back when she actually  _growls_ in a way she didn’t even know she could.  It roars from deep in her chest, the menacing and feral sound of a horribly wounded wild thing.

Moments pass in limbo.  Slowly, the wolf limps away into the dark, out of her awareness.

Then finally.   _Finally_  the human tears come, not tears of shock and desperation but tears of grief and loss and fragile things shattering beyond repair.  They’re like rain on a hot day and she’s thankful to be left alone with them.

She cries beyond exhaustion, for what feels like seconds and days and centuries blurring into eternity.  Eventually she’s spent and numb and tumbling into the aether of sleep as she dimly realizes it’s Mickey  _– it’s not **him**  he’s gone  **he’s**   **gone**  it’s only Mickey –_ hoisting her into his arms and carrying her away.

Away into an unwelcome world with a sky full of zeppelins, where gingerbread tastes empty and white walls remind her of dying.

Away into life with only half a heart, with no one to answer her plaintive howls and nowhere to call home.


End file.
